---
title: While he was absent the housekeeper went to the boy’s room and tried… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: While he was absent the housekeeper went to the boy’s room and tried to wake him. Who acts: magician, absent housekeeper. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 13, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 13, sentence 95

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While he was absent the housekeeper went to the boy’s room and tried to wake him.

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**Who acts:** magician, absent housekeeper · **What happens:** be, go, try, wake · **To what, where:** room, magician

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This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 13. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (magician, absent housekeeper), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg2435:13:95
# text = While he was absent the housekeeper went to the boy’s room and tried to wake him.
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	4	mark	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	absent	absent	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	amod	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	housekeeper	housekeeper	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
7	went	go	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	to	to	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	’s	's	PART	POS	_	10	case	_	_
12	room	room	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	tried	try	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
15	to	to	PART	TO	_	16	mark	_	_
16	wake	wake	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	xcomp	_	_
17	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | magician |  |  |  |  | absent *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **go** | past | the absent housekeeper |  |  | the boy's room |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to room=Initial\_Location |
| 3 | **try** | past | the absent housekeeper *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn try-61.1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 4 | **wake** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | the absent housekeeper *not said here* | magician |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent he=Patient |

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One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Text:** «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 2435 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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